Chief Mason

You may not operate a motor vehicle, within the first six (6) months after receiving your "Junior Operator's License" while any person under the age of 18 is in the vehicle (other than yourself or an immediate family member), unless you are accompanied by a person who is at least 21 years old, has at least one year of driving experience, holds a valid driver's license from Massachusetts or another state, and is occupying a seat beside you.

NOTE: If you violate the restriction against carrying a passenger under age 18, you will be subject to a license suspension of 30 days for a first offense, 60 days for a second offense and 90 days for a third or subsequent offense. The law requires the Registrar to impose this suspension in addition to any other penalty, fine, suspension, revocation or requirement that may be imposed in connection with a violation committed at the time you were violating the passenger restriction. The Registrar has determined that the period of suspension for a violation of the passenger restriction must run after any other suspension has been completed. When your "Junior Operator's License" is reinstated, you will still have the remainder of the six (6) month restriction period to complete that existed at the beginning of the suspension period. Note: While a violation of the "time restriction" between midnight and 1:00 a.m. and between 4:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m. is subject to "secondary enforcement" (see Q # 22), a violation of the passenger restriction is not. A violation of the passenger restriction is subject to "primary enforcement" and may be enforced at any time of day or night.

Young drivers, high risk
Inexperience is cause of most accidents by teens


WAREHAM -- A box that sits on the tile floor in front of Tanya Borges' high school locker still fills daily with keepsakes and private messages.
The hard-working 17-year-old with a knockout smile died Feb. 12 in a speeding car that she should never have been riding in. Miss Borges was killed when the driver lost control of the car while traveling at high speeds on Interstate-195 in Mattapoisett and slammed the car into a tree.
The driver, a 16-year-old Wareham High School friend of Miss Borges, spent several days recuperating in the hospital with head injuries, knowing her friend was dead. Upon her release, the minor learned she faces arraignment in Wareham Juvenile Court on charges of motor vehicle homicide, negligent operation of a motor vehicle and violating the state's junior operator license law.
Under the law, a 16-year-old driver may not operate a motor vehicle while any passenger under the age of 18 is in the car other than an immediate family member, unless accompanied by person who is at least 21 years old.
"It's a complete tragedy," said State Police Trooper Steve Lopes, the investigating officer who had to file charges against the 16-year-old driver.
It's also a common tragedy -- a fact borne out just days later, when a speeding car carrying three 16-year-olds slid on a wet road and crashed into a tree in Plymouth, killing two and injuring a third.
The two accidents highlight a national problem that Massachusetts has battled with mixed success since it enacted its junior operator license law in 1998: how to keep 16-year-olds, statistically the deadliest drivers on the road, from killing and injuring themselves and their friends in car accidents.
Injury from motor vehicle crashes is the leading cause of death among U.S. teenagers, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). The crash risk among 16- and 17-year-old drivers is almost three times as high as among 18- and 19-year-old drivers.
The junior license is designed to give the youngest drivers a chance to gain driving experience and maturity while limiting their exposure to risky situations. The numbers of accidents involving 16-year-old drivers has dropped since the junior driving law was enacted, aided by an intensive effort by educators and law enforcement unheard of just a decade ago.
But the percentage of 16-year-olds who get into crashes is still staggering. In 1997, a year before the law went into effect, 47 percent of all 16-year-old drivers in Massachusetts had car crashes, according to the Registry of Motor Vehicles. There was only a 3 percent decrease in the number of 16- to 17-year-olds involved in car accidents from 1997 to 2000, the most recent statistically relevant data available, according to the Governor's Highway Safety Bureau.

Stories and statistics

More than the numbers, it is the stories teenagers tell that powerfully illustrate how tragedies like the one that killed Tanya Borges still occur regularly. Sixteen-year-old drivers commonly break the terms of their junior license by giving their friends car rides -- often wild, risky rides, teens say.
"Oh, it's common," said Amanda White, 17, senior class president at Wareham High School. "It happened to me. I was in the car with four other people, I'm in the front seat and I'm the only one in the car wearing a seat belt, and we're going, like, 100 miles-per-hour and the music was blasting. Forget about it. I was scared."
Miss White said she believed the driver, then a high school junior, was 16 at the time.
What occurs more often than a speeding car full of rollicking 16-year-olds is a car full of rollicking 16-year-olds traveling within the speed limit, said Michael Collins, a 16-year-old 11th-grader at Wareham High School.
"You see juniors come to school every day with a car-load full of people," Mr. Collins said.
Contrary to what many people believe, car accidents involving 16-year-old drivers aren't caused primarily by drinking. Sixteen-year-old drivers involved in fatal crashes have alcohol in their systems half as often as 18-year-olds, according to the NHTSA.
Rather, car accidents involving 16-year-old drivers are most commonly the result of the driver's inexperience and inability to make mature decisions regarding safety. Studies by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety show that teenage drivers are at much greater risk of being involved in a fatal crash when teen passengers are in the car. Fifty-eight percent of teenagers killed in crashes were riding in a car driven by a teenager, according to a 1998 NHTSA report.
"They have great reflexes but unfortunately they just don't have the experience, and that's what a lot of these cases fall under," said John Paul, manager of traffic safety for AAA Southern New England. "The more people you put in a car driven by teens, the more distracted the drivers get. One kid and you get a certain percentage more likely, two kids and that number goes up, and so on."

Law gets Tougher

Based on that knowledge, Massachusetts lawmakers in 1998 passed the Graduated Driver Licensing law, which created a three-stage licensing process that phases in driving privileges, providing restrictions for a period of time after the junior operator license is obtained.
Under the law, drivers between the ages of 16½ and 18 may not operate a motor vehicle within the first six months after receiving a junior license while any passenger under the age of 18 is in the vehicle, other than an immediate family member, unless the driver is accompanied by a person who is at least 21 years old, has at least one year of driving experience, holds a valid driver's license and is occupying the front passenger seat.
Junior operators who violate the passenger restriction are subject to a license suspension of up to 90 days.
The law also forbids junior operators from driving between midnight and 5 a.m. unless accompanied by a parent or a legal guardian and provides enhanced penalties for certain motor vehicle offenses committed by junior operators, such as speeding and racing and those involving alcohol or drugs.
The law represented the most significant change in the standard license in at least 50 years, Mr. Paul said. At the same time, government, law enforcement officials and educators have increasingly funded and carried out efforts to warn teens about the dangers they face as new drivers.
The junior driver law and education efforts have paid off to some extent. From 1997 to 2002, there was a 31 percent decrease in the number of 16- to 17-year-old drivers involved in fatal crashes in Massachusetts.
"We're seeing an ever-increasing sophistication of teen driving education and outreach," said Brook W. Chipman of the Governor's Highway Safety Bureau. "Is that responsible for the lower numbers? It certainly didn't hurt, that's for sure. The downward trend is heartening, but it's certainly not a reason for people to be satisfied. Unfortunately, as the Plymouth crash and other crashes indicate, you still don't have to look too far to gain personal experience with this issue."

Taking it seriously

Though things have improved, getting teens to drive safely and take the restrictions of the junior license law seriously is still an uphill battle, road safety experts say. The problem is slightly worse in SouthCoast than statewide, and in some SouthCoast communities more than others.
In 2002, 5.1 percent of all car accidents in Massachusetts involved teenage drivers, according to the Governor's Highway Safety Bureau. In comparison, 12.7 percent of all accidents in Freetown and 12.7 percent of all accidents in Rochester involved teen drivers. Of 11 SouthCoast communities, only New Bedford and Fall River experienced fewer accidents involving teen drivers than the statewide average from 1997 to 2002.
The higher percentage of accidents in SouthCoast involving teen drivers is to some extent the result of the rural nature of many of the communities, road safety experts said. Unlike in the city, teens have to drive in the small towns and suburbs to get anywhere -- often along winding, narrow country roads.
But the problem is compounded by the fact that teenage drivers in Southeastern Massachusetts wear seatbelts at a lower rate than in any other region of the state. For that reason, State Police focused especially on Southeastern Massachusetts when they launched the "click it or ticket" seatbelt enforcement campaign several years ago.
Again, enforcement and education efforts have had some success. From 1999 to 2003, seatbelt use among teen drivers in Southeastern Massachusetts jumped from 37 percent to 58 percent, according to the Governor's Highway Safety Bureau. Among drivers of all ages statewide, 62 percent wore seatbelts in 2003, according to the statistics.
Safety officials say data regarding enforcement of the junior driver law are not available, but State Police who work on the front lines in the battle to protect teen drivers sometimes express frustration that parents aren't always more vigilant in making sure their 16-year-olds are following the terms of their junior license.
"It's quite unfortunate when you have a parent who isn't being a good role model, who isn't saying, 'Don't have other kids in the car with you until you hit that six-month mark,'" State Police Sgt. David R. Paine Jr. said. "Parents should be following through, enforcing the law and educating their kids, telling them every day that a poor choice could result in some very bad consequences."

Raising driving Age is unpopular

In the fight to further reduce the dangers that young drivers face, there is always talk from some lawmakers and road safety advocates of upping the state's driving age to 17. Often, parents are the most vocal opponents. Busy parents tired of chauffeur duty are often as eager for their children to begin driving as the children are.
"They like it better than I do," Mr. Collins, the Wareham High School junior who recently got his driver's license, said of his parents. "Now, I can chauffeur my sisters. I run errands. Of course, there is that nervousness. Mother gets nervous."
Samantha Clark, a 15-year-old sophomore who is looking forward to driving, expressed the same sentiment.
"My parents can't wait," Miss Clark said. "My mom lives two hours away and my parents always have to drive me there and back. They can't wait for me to be able to do it myself."
Even responsible parents who are aware of the risks that driving presents to young drivers and talk to their children about the dangers struggle with knowing when a child is old enough to get behind the wheel. Peter Balzarini, a teacher at Wareham High School whose 15-year-old daughter is taking driver education at the school in preparation for getting her junior license, said he worries about the prospect of his daughter behind the wheel. But he believes 16½ is old enough to drive.
"My daughter and I have talked about this. She's on the cusp of getting her license," Mr. Balzarini said. "We all as parents keep our fingers crossed. It's a scary, scary proposition for any parent the first time you send your kid in the car by themselves. But I don't know if pushing (the legal driving age) back would do that much help. Wherever you put the line, you're not automatically creating a foolproof situation where you're not going to have these problems. No matter what age they are when they start driving, problems are going to occur because they are new, inexperienced drivers."
Often, many teenage drivers learn the hard way. At Wareham High School, Tanya Borges' classmates will be reminded every time they pass Miss Borges' locker, which will not be assigned to another student.
"It really shook everyone up when Tanya died," said Ms. White, the Wareham High School senior. "Especially people close to her got really woken up by it. A lot of her best friends are saying, 'I'm going to be a safer driver.'"

 

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